This development had left Al really confused. 'Is this a coincidence, or is god playing tricks on me again!?' Al sighed as he thought about how he would never find out if he got his element from his core or [Mana Manipulation]. 'Or maybe any would have been fine?'

One thing he did know though, was that he had awakened a non-primal element. Those were supremely rare back on earth, so much he had only met a couple in his life, and were generally much more powerful than the primal elementalists of the same level. Their elements were harder to train though, so they hadn't really reached high levels by the point when Al died.

Al decided to try out his element. He jutted his hand forward and moved a small clump of his mana in front of it, then turned into his element. It turned into a small cluster of white light with a blue glow that quickly dispersed into bolts that grounded themselves onto closeby metallic objects, though about half went to Al's hand. His body seemed to have become resistant to electricity, or at least his own electric mana, as the only thing the bolt did was tickle him. It wasn't a proper spell, but it showed Al the great promise of this element, since this had barely used 2% of his recently expanded mana pool.

Mages could basically do two things: create a replica of their element made with mana, like a fireball for fire mages, that after some time fizzled out of existence, and move existing things made of that element, like a wall by an earth mage.

Earth and air mages almost always used the second method, since they were almost always surrounded by their elements. It was also very inefficient to create mass out of mana.

Fire mages used the first method, since it was much more efficient to create fire, due to it being a type of energy. Water mages usually used this method too, though if they were near big amounts of fresh water (impurities made it harder to move your element) they would prove fearsome oponents, moving up to millions of litres around them.

Since lightning was also an energy, Al expected the conversion to be efficient, but not to this degree. He wanted to go outside already to test it with [Body Enhancement], but he had to finish healing first. For now he would work on getting used to his new core. 

After a couple of hours, a well-rested Yuly visited him, and finished healing up his arm. He asked her to look at Mr. Chu (the guy who was used for target practice by the Badger-pine), but she said she had already done all she could when nobody noticed, and that she thought the man should be able to walk again after some rehabilitation. It helped ease Al's consciousness.

'Since when did I care so much about the consequences of my actions? I swear, I've turned into a softie after reincarnating.' Al thought as he lied down, ready to turn in for the day, despite having barely done anything.

Somewhere inside a dark room, a hooded figure was kneeling in front of an imposing man shrouded in darkness. The man said "So, is the plan going smoothly?"

"Yes, he have managed do successfully open hatches in the Ki vein to leak mana into the eastern forest."

"Good. And when will the beasts be ready?"

"Judging by their current pace, we expect them to start reaching Rank 3 in around two years and for the percentage to be at an acceptable level in three."

"That's faster than expected. Any possible setbacks?"

"There are a couple of isolated villages in the affected zone, but they will see the increase of Ki as a blessing or a stroke of good luck and won't report to the authorities."

"Good. Send a spy crow to each village just in case someone has a different idea, and dispose of them if that is the case."

"It shall be done."

"I will enter seclusion now. Do not disturb me until it is time to tame the beasts."

"Yes, my lord."

Al woke up with a churning feeling in his stomach. 'Feels as if I'd slept though a trope. Did someone talk about me and I sneezed in my sleep or something? Oh wait that was Japanese, wasn't it?'

He ignored it and sat up, the prickly feeling in his legs was almost gone at this point. He had spent the past two weeks since the accident mostly cultivating, but he had barely made any progress. It seemed like getting to the next realm was much harder that passing through the stages in a realm.

Al was itching to use his body a bit though, so he quickly got some breakfast in and went outside, only to see Koro out in the freezing cold, doing push-ups with one hand. 'This kid is crazy.' 

Koro saw him and quickly stood up, seemingly wanting to say something. Al cut him off. "Duel?" He said. 

Koro simply nodded and got into a fighting stance, so Al followed suit and activated his [Body Enhancement] skill using his elemental mana. Suddenly he felt a fuzzy sensation throughout his body as the currents ran through him, and he felt his mind move faster. He was seeing everything slightly in slow motion. Everything felt slightly jittery however, like a low frame rate picture. Al guessed it was due to his brain speeding up, but his eyes giving signals at the same rate.

When he dodged a punch Koro threw at him, he felt his muscles respond perfectly to his increased signal speed, meaning both his muscles and his brain had sped up the same amount. 'That's convenient'

Koro no longer charged recklessly, but his movements were still easy to see through. Al gracefully dodged them as he grew used to the new speed he was functioning at, then threw jabs at the hulk of a child. But Koro just took the damage. It would take more than that to topple him over.

Al prepared a special surprise for Koro as he packed all the lightning mana he could into one hand, then weaved through Koro's barrage of punches and placed the palm on his chest. He discharged the makeshift defibrillator and Koro couldn't withstand the currents as he lost his balance and toppled down onto the grass. Winter had just ended, and the snow was about to finish melting away, so after he checked his pulse and found he was fine, he just let him lying there, not worried about him catching a cold.

The rest of the day was spent picking up Porcuspine MKII from the remains of the Supra bunny next to the wall (thank the ambient mana for only leaving the bones and sparing me the sight of a giant rotting bunny) and going back to where the two Rank 2 beasts ambushed him, to see if there was anything of interest. He decided to take the Bear-boar's tusks, since they had to had been tough to support the beast without snapping, even if a lot of its weight had been supported by the packed earth walls.

Unfortunately they didn't make a good weapon since they were thick and curved, but if given to a good craftsman they would make for a good adult sized sword each. They were as dense as metal, but much, much tougher, so Al could already guess who that would fit perfectly.

Getting the things out of the hole was arduous, but nothing a good pulley system couldn't solve. It was funny that this was the second time he had been forced to make a pulley system while in a forest, so he finished it rather quickly and hurried (as much as one could hurry when carrying two things each heavier than oneself) back home.

'Home huh... hadn't thought of any place that way for quite a long time'

He struggled to get the tusks over the wall, but he managed it after enhancing his body with pure mana for quite a while, and finally reached the building just before nightfall.

He had a quick dinner to calm his rumbling belly and went back to his room. From a window he saw a crow sitting on the roof of the orphanage. He didn't like how it looked at him, so he threw one of the normal spines he now carried with him at it (enhancing his throwing arm first, of course) and pierced it straight between the eyes. It fell onto the ground with a dry thud.

'Good thing PETA isn't a thing here, because I don't feel one bit of remorse for that.'